The Republican incumbent touts his business roots and outsider credentials – almost six years after he went to Washington.
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Ryan had downplayed the primary challenge and rarely, if at all, engaged with Nehlen.
In an emphatic show of his support within the district, House Speaker Paul Ryan crushed a primary challenger Tuesday, putting an exclamation point on a race that drew attention from across the country. But Trump eventually endorsed Ryan.
In an unusual legislative race, incumbent Democratic state Sen. Ron Johnson, who knocked him out of office in 2010. Ryan spent significantly on TV ads and enjoyed the support of party leaders, GOP elected officials and talk radio hosts, a major force in Republican politics in southeastern Wisconsin.
Ryan addressed reporters in Janesville soon after the results and presented an upbeat message, saying residents shared his desire “for political leadership that’s inclusive, not divisive”. Ryan planned to speak after a victor is declared in his congressional race against longshot Republican challenger Paul Nehlen. He challenged Ryan to an arm-wrestling match if he wouldn’t debate him.
Ryan has been trying to downplay the race.
Those gestures thrust Mr. Nehlen into the middle of an intraparty feud between Mr. Trump and Mr. Ryan, the Republican vice-presidential nominee in 2012. “People know who I am, they know what I believe in, and they know that I mean what I say and I say what I mean, and I don’t do it in a mean way”.
With 28.4 percent reporting, Ryan was leading 85 percent to Nehlen’s 15 percent. Ryan said it needs to be renegotiated, and that the votes aren’t there to pass it. That included Bob and Maureen Becker, who said Ryan went to high school with their daughters. But it only came after he’d given major air time and attention to the little-known Nehlen.
Two big names in Wisconsin politics easily beat their rivals in yesterday’s primary election. They expected turnout to be about 16 percent.
“It’s not very busy”, said city clerk Kris Teske, noting that it was sharply slower than in April, when the presidential primary drove turnout to 14 percent by the same time of day.
There were about 100 blue-collar workers at this plant, where Ryan fielded a handful of questions from employees, including one on the Green Bay Packers’ chances this year.
The primary’s other top race was in northeastern Wisconsin, where GOP Rep. Reid Ribble’s retirement opened a congressional seat that could swing either way.
It’s a reversal from Ryan’s stance a year ago – when he’d touted the potential benefits of the Pacific Rim deal and said he hoped it would get a vote in Congress. The polls close at 8 p.m.
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Nehlen was likened to Trump as he shared or took further some of the nominee’s controversial positions. Trump relented just three days later, but the burst of publicity was priceless for Nehlen. And while he conceded the loss in the primary election, he sounded less than defeated, urging his supporters to launch a movement to “liberate” Wisconsin’s First Congressional District.
